James Stark, Sandman Slim, is working for a secret Christian agency that is intent on keeping the demons and magically infused citizens of LA in check. Meanwhile the entire world is falling apart, under a deluge of never ending rain LA is flooding and emptying out. God, the actual god, has had a breakdown and his split personalities have literally split him into various pieces, and are fighting each other. Stark trapped one part of the fractured deity down in hell, to get out of being Lucifer.

The Angra Om Ya, a powerful set of old gods, are attempting to come back while the chaos continues, and only Stark and his magic eight ball (a powerful weapon he doesn’t know how to use) can stop them.

There’s also a serial killer on the loose, cutting people up and putting them back together as vessels for the ancient gods to possess.

Can Stark work out the eight ball in time? Can he stop the serial killer? Will his girlfriend leave him? Will heaven collapse?

If you’re coming to a series six books in then I think you should be a bit lost, but Kadrey kindly provides enough explanation of the back story so that every makes sense.

The fact is, as a reader of the series, I remember all of it. I read a lot, I watch a lot, and most things pretty much trickle out of my sieve-like brain. But not Kadrey’s books. They stick in there, their weird scenes, characters and a hellish LA are imprinted on my memory. Sure, I don’t remember everything, but I remember most of it. These books are memorable, and that’s a lot more than I can say for most books.

Kadrey’s characters and writing has attitude. Stark would pick you up, slam your head against the wall, and kick you while you’re down.

The filmic quality of the books is finally realised with the new style covers for the paperbacks.

The Stark books are not likely to be anything like the books you’ve read before, and that’s more than a good thing, that’s a great thing. You don’t often find a writer who can quite tap into your nastiness and bring it out in book form, but Kadrey’s done just that.

The man is a genius, and while this isn’t the best of the Stark novels (the series does seem to be losing a bit of momentum), I’ll be sticking with it until the end, because it’s still the best urban fantasy ever.

This is the fifth book in the Sandman Slim series, and a bloody good series it is. James Stark is Sandman Slim, a man sent to hell by a former friend and forced to fight demons in an arena. He eventually fights his way out of hell and ends up in LA where his chronicled adventures begin with the first book in the series.

With book five we have more of the same, and this is a great jumping on point if you really can’t manage to get the first four books. The background is explained and all that’s gone before is briefly detailed here, giving those who have forgone the previous books (don’t so it, you’re missing out on the most remarkable series of books, start at the bloody beginning!) enough of the backstory that everything falls nicely into place.

In this book Stark is searching for the mysterious 8 Ball, a god-killing weapon that has fallen into the hands of the god-murdering angel and Stark’s personal nemesis Aelita. With his rag-tag bunch of friends, including an ex-communicated priest, a Jade (vampire-like creature), an immortal Frenchman and a robot, he heads deep into Kill City, a former shopping centre and now hellhole. Throw in God with a personality disorder, Satan being an angel again, crazy old world gods intent on eating the world, a messed up hell in the midst of a make-over, and a whole mess of other stuff and you have the fifth Sandman Slim novel.

Kadrey’s in-you-face-style and never-let up pace make for exciting and non-stop reading. This is a freight train of a book and you just won’t want to get off. The misadventures of our anti-hero are riveting, with Kadrey unafraid to put him and his crew in various dangers.

The new paperback format has a filmic slant, which is echoed in the film references made throughout the books, and the film-like quality of the series: think Quintin Tarantino doing a Dennis Wheatley adaptation on acid, or an early John Woo (The Killer) and early Tobe Hooper (Texas Chainsaw Massacre) collaborating on the most epic B-movie of all time, and you’ll get the idea.

The Sandman Slim books really have to be read to be believed, no matter how much hyperbole I use to describe them it won’t do the books justice. They are awesome in a world of mundaneity. You have not lived if you haven’t read a Kadrey novel.

It’s not often that a book comes along that excites me. It’s not often that anything excites me. In fact, it’s a very rare occasion that anything wakes me from the tortured stupor that is my day to day life. I read almost constantly to escape the dull oblivion that is my pitiful existence.

And then a book like this comes along…

James Stark (demon fighter and part-Angel celebrity) is dragged into LA’s zombie while being Lucifer’s bodyguard. And that’s barely scraping the surface of this story, but I don’t want to ruin the surprises in store for you.

This is the second book in the Sandman Slim series, and if I haven’t read the first book then go read it. Go now. What are you waiting? Go, just go. No, don’t read any further, get it now! Right now I tell you!

You could probably pick this book up and struggle along to catch up, but don’t. The first book is a hell of a story (literally), and there’s far too much you’ll have missed out on if you start the series with book two. Although this is pretty much a stand-alone story, this is very much the second part of a series, and there’s a ton of background (and it’s really fun background!) that you’ll miss out on if you skip the first book. Do not skip the first book! DO NOT!

Stark is a serious piece of work, an alcoholic, chain-smoking, demon assassin, murderer, kick-ass detective; just the kind of dude Lucifer wants as a bodyguard. Our hellish anti-hero is a brilliantly humorous, angry young man, killing vampires and zombies with witty asides, and inventive techniques.

Kadrey has produced an LA dripping with monster filth, which works so well. This is a city bound-up with demons and hellions, drowning in Sub-Rosa (magical families), and is an antidote to those good folks in the Harry Potter novels. These magicians would cook up Harry and his pals for breakfast and then shit them out as zombies. This is hardcore witchcraft, terror and death.

This book is demented genius. Kadrey raised the bar for urban fantasy with Sandman Slim, and the expectations were high for the second book in the series. Not only does Kadrey gives us another exciting episode, but he continues to explore one of the most fascinating and engaging narrators/creatures in modern genre literature.